come down the pike

verb

To emerge, come up; be about to happen; to approach or arrive on the scene; to present (itself or oneself).

Similar
come down the linecome down the road
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Meanings

verbcome down the pike (third-person singular simple present comes down the pike, present participle coming down the pike, simple past came down the pike, past participle come down the pike)

present singular third person comes down the pike · participle present coming down the pike · past came down the pike

  1. USpersonthingTo emerge, come up; be about to happen; to approach or arrive on the scene; to present (itself or oneself).

    "[T]hey're the finest football leaders that ever came down the pike."

    1902, Ralph Henry Barbour, chapter 11, in Behind the Line
    3 more examples

    Alfred Stieglitz was the best photographer ever to come down the pike.

    1949 November 14, “Art: Many Ways”, in Time, archived from the original on 07 Mar 2016

    “For me, it's a harbinger of larger cultural changes coming down the pike.”

    2014 May 26, Amy Verner, “From Humble Sneaker to Luxury Icon”, in The New York Times, →ISSN

    “I knew it was coming on down the pike, just not at the rate it hit us,” said Sheree Renée Thomas, the editor of The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, which was founded in 1949.

    2023 February 23, Michael Levenson, quoting Sheree Thomas, “Science Fiction Magazines Battle a Flood of Chatbot-Generated Stories”, in The New York Times, →ISSN

    Synonyms: come down the line, come down the road

Synonyms & antonyms

verbTo emerge, come up; be about to happen; to approach or arrive on the scene; to present (itself or oneself).

Similar
come down the linecome down the road
Also see
come down the linecome down the road

Origin

From pike, short for turnpike (“toll expressway”).

Full word history & related roots →
Cite this entry
APA

come down the pike. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 5, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/come%20down%20the%20pike

MLA

“come down the pike.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/come%20down%20the%20pike. Accessed November 5, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “come down the pike,” accessed November 5, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/come%20down%20the%20pike.

Source: come down the pike on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.